


interlude

by AdiAbieu



Series: anthology [3]
Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-16
Updated: 2018-12-16
Packaged: 2019-09-20 12:44:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,230
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17022873
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AdiAbieu/pseuds/AdiAbieu
Summary: She retrieves the 10 page report, feeling the weight of it in her grip. Even at that length, it is enough to tether her to the room despite the overtaking surrealism that Maggie is agreeing to her slightly off-kilter fantasy.An exploration of porn, periods and possessiveness in a new relationship.





	interlude

**Author's Note:**

> An exploration of porn, periods and possession in a new lesbian relationship.
> 
> First half set circa 2x16, second just after 2x17.

Of the dozen women she had slept with, Maggie has never found the companionship she has with Alex. 

When she started off as a uniform, a senior officer once advised her that the only relationship that could ever work was with another cop, because they were the only ones who would understand the tests of the job. Alex may be a different agency, but a similar line of work, and almost a decade later, she realises that officer may have been right all along. 

They click in a way Maggie’s other girlfriends haven’t. She doesn’t have to censor herself when she discusses work. She doesn’t have to hold back with gory details, or fear causing offence. Alex may be new to lesbian relationships but so far she has matched Maggie stride for stride.

She realises this as she reaches Kara’s apartment one night, balancing chinese take out in one hand and wine in the other. While Supergirl has been called for a rescue, Alex sits at the dining table. Her laptop is open, paperwork sprawled around her. She wears reading glasses and glares down at a document that bears her own signature.

Maggie takes the seat opposite, prying the lids from the tinfoil containers and sliding Alex’s food towards her. 

“Thanks,” Alex mumbles, engrossed in her work. 

With a smirk, Maggie starts in on her own food. “Since when did you wear glasses?”

“Since I no longer wanted to suffer eye strain from staring at small print for hours,” Alex replies. She scrawls notes on a scrap piece of paper, then slides a closed document holder across the table, “Can you check this for me?” 

Maggie takes the document holder, shifting her food aside. “Check?”

“We’re having a review by the State Department so I’m auditing some old cases. I don’t think I looked at this investigation from the angle I should have, and I need a fresh perspective.” 

Alex is distracted by what she’s reading, but Maggie raises an eyebrow anyway. “Should you be giving me this information?” 

Not looking up, Alex mumbles, “Probably not.”

“Why are you?”

“Because this information is declassified to everyone on my squad.” Alex flips the scrap piece of paper, starting afresh with her notes. “You’re on my squad, Sawyer.”

Part of her hates the pride in her stomach. Before Alex, she was on a warpath for the DEO. She shouldn’t need their approval to run missions or feel good about her ability as a detective. And yet another part of her relishes this; relishes her girlfriend praising her skills and intelligence and valuing her as an asset. 

“That official, is it?”

Finally, Alex looks up, a twinkle in her eye. “Can be, if you want it to be.”

They spend a solid fifteen minutes refiling papers into the correct folders and cleaning up spilled sweet and sour sauce, but the sex they had which swept the pages off the table is worth it. They wear innocent expressions by the time Kara returns, but Supergirl is too self-absorbed to notice their dishevelled appearances. 

In reality, there are few things left off the table that Alex gets uncomfortable about. They are beginning to open up more and more with each other, learn each other, from the mundane to the deep-seated issues. The trivial comes in everyday life, in the snatches of throwaway comments; 

As they thumb through a restaurant menu: “I don’t like mushrooms.”

Before Maggie turns to address a fellow officer: “I think blue is a beautiful colour on you. It’s actually my favourite.”

Dealing with an escaped Hijaki hound: “Honestly, I still think dogs are the best animals on the planet.”

The deepest comes in the quieter moments, especially following Valentine’s and Jeremiah’s betrayal. They cracked through each other’s crust to find the searing hot magma of pain underneath. 

One night they are supposed to go to dinner, but it is Maggie’s father’s birthday and Eliza had called about cancelling a visit in order to attend a special summit and both of them have irrational reactions. Instead of going out to dinner, they’re warming their socks by the fire and sharing war stories. The scars they gained as rookies, the more intimate traumas both physical and mental. 

They crack open a bottle of scotch and as their pain dims, their willingness to share increases. 

“The first time that I came in contact with Yuzuzu blood was two weeks before my detective exam,” Maggie says, shaking her head and then leaning it back against the couch cushion, “I thought I’d never walk again.” 

Alex hangs her head in understanding, her chin to her chest. Yuzuzu blood contains a nerve agent that can leave humans temporarily paralysed for up for a week. 

“That must have been terrifying.” She takes a long slug of the scotch and then passes the bottle. She wipes her chin with the back of her hand. “About to do your detective exam, and then thinking your career was over.”

Maggie scoffs. She waits two more snaps of the fire before she replies. “I think it was a blessing in disguise. The SciDiv lieutenant came to visit me in hospital and I said I was kinda fascinated in what happened...she laughed, suggested I transfer into her department if I passed the test.”

She tilts the scotch, watching the fire dancing in golden flashes through the liquid. “So I did.”

As the surface of the scotch slides deeper down the bottle, the alcohol diminishes all tact. Alex’s eyes are glassy as she lolls her head over, her toes twitching in their black and white socks. 

“Do you ever wish you could go back to when your father still loved you?”

Maggie knows they’re too drunk for logic, and Alex will no doubt apologise for the bluntness and inconsiderate tone tomorrow. But right now, she can hear the question underneath the slurred tone. The fifteen year old girl, scared, grieving. Losing the man she idolised. She sees the devastation that a single horrific truth can bring, how it can ruin a childhood of happy memories.

And she relates so desperately in that moment, seeing that girl in Alex’s eyes. 

“Yeah, sometimes I do,” she admits. 

Alex closes her eyes, two fat teardrops rolling down her flushed cheeks, and Maggie lets her head fall onto her shoulder. 

One thing Alex has really become more confident with is talking about sex. She tends, whether she realises it or not, to still sometimes whisper  _ You’re wet, _ as if she’s surprised that Maggie’s body reacts that way to her. 

There are only two things that Maggie has known Alex to react strangely to: pornography and periods. Those topics stand out as the issues they can’t seem to discuss in their usual fluid way. 

Firstly, periods. She knows they’re a new area for any lesbian in their first relationship to navigate. Alex has an advantage in her medical experience and her job now; she isn’t exactly squeamish when it comes to other people’s blood. Yet the taboo always tints things. 

Their first cycle together is a bit of a dance. Alex isn’t weird, but she’s trying too hard not to be, and in a way that’s worse. By the second, she’s prepared, caring and unjudging. She wraps Maggie in a blanket, lets her rage against her about something as simple as water drops along the floor, and accepts her apology with grace.

And as for pornography, Maggie knows Alex isn’t a prude, but when an offhand joke splinters into a rather intense discussion, it leaves her with more questions about her lover than answers. It’s this second topic that hooks her attention following a case that involved alien exploitation for dark web porn sites. Alex seems keen to stray away from the obvious jibes that fellow agents and officers are making. She notices how Alex ducks and dives and pretends she can’t hear the jokes, and she files it away for later.  

Alex has spoken a little about her experiences with boys, with men, especially when it came to penetration. Perhaps her view of pornography was tainted by misogynistic, over-lit bedrooms that take up the majority of thumbnails on the well-known websites. 

Yet while Maggie has just begun to dig beneath the surface of what Alex has used in her path to discovery of her sexuality, she knows there are things Alex hasn’t had the confidence to admit to her yet. Try as Alex might to prove it, Maggie knows that she didn’t go from denying she was gay to going down on her without hesitation in a matter of weeks without a few careful internet searches. Knowing what those searches were and what she researched is a key curiosity of Maggie’s.  

As their relationship unfolds and their lives become more and more entangled, Maggie starts to invite Alex more into gay society, and lets her experience things she hasn’t got to yet. While out for a few drinks with Officer Rhodes and her girlfriend, she sees how Alex flourishes around the other gay women. She becomes relaxed, involved in the back and forth, picks up on all of the  _ family _ jokes. 

On her next run to the bar, Maggie realises that Alex has probably never had the opportunity to talk about sexuality before. She waves at the bartender and wonders what extent Alex talks to Kara about her, if she even can. 

“Never have I ever seen you with a girl like that.”

Maggie looks at Rhodes, who joins her, elbows planted forward. Then, she glances back at where Alex is being thoroughly entertained by a story from Officer Rhodes’ girlfriend. 

“Alex can hold her own,” she answers, “Another round?” 

“Brand spanking new, Mags?” Rhodes eyes the bartender pouring their drinks. “I didn’t think that was your type.”

“Spanking has nothing to do with it,” she mumbles, putting money on the bar. 

Rhodes chuckles. “I bet it does, dating a fed.”

They share a snicker at that, and Rhodes lifts two of the beers.

“She seems good for you,” she says, tipping her chin towards Maggie, “Even if she is new.”

“She’s special.”

“What do you think about Alice?”

Maggie surveys the bar as a whole, taking a long breath, and then focuses on their booth. Alice is a firefighter, well aware of the strange hours and perilous duties of the emergency services. She would have been a prime match for Rhodes, if she hadn’t been sitting stroking along Alex’s palm, pretending to read the lines.

Rhodes and Sawyer had both started as new transfers into the NCPD; one from Gotham and one from Star City. They respected each other because they didn’t bullshit each other, so Maggie doesn’t now. 

“I think she needs to keep her hands to herself,” she warns. 

Rhodes’ shoulders deflate. “Yeah, I thought the same.”

Trust and loyalty spring to mind, things Maggie isn’t sure she deserves considering her past, but Alex doesn’t know about any of that yet. She shoves it down. 

Keeping her eyes on their phones and on their drinks, she appreciates Alex’s attentiveness, but she also sees the faint blush when a pretty girl like Alice flirts with her. 

Later, they’re drinking coffee at Noonan’s when it happens again. The purple haired waitress is clearly into Alex, but her eyes-wide-open girlfriend mistakes her flirting for friendliness. She wants to test Alex’s awareness. 

So Maggie brings it up. Her yoga instructor’s legs. NCPD secretary Mrs Cathers’ precinct-renowned ass. The DEO technician working at infrared tech that has a careful touch. She tries to encourage Alex out of her den with a trail of breadcrumbs.

She keeps pointing out hot women, pushing the limits, but it backfires. 

One night, they sit together eating a chicken stir fry with noodles that Alex had managed to cobble together from the meagre ingredients in her fridge. She’s midway through an anecdote about an old crush on a college professor when she stops, realising Alex is quiet. She stares down into the mess of noodles on her plate as if she’s trying to make sense of it, trying to discern a pattern. 

“Alex, are you alright?” Maggie asks. 

The arrow comes out of the forest without warning, lodging itself in her heart-

“Am I good enough for you?” 

The clink of Maggie’s cutlery hitting her plate is the immediate answer, able to reply when Maggie’s gaping mouth cannot. 

It had been an awful day. Alex had been texting Maggie all day, first about feeling like she had failed an important mission and secondly about her latest falling out with Kara over Mon El. She talks again first, pushing some chicken around. 

“The way you talk sometimes,” she says, glancing up and then going back to the chicken on her plate, “I feel like you’re being held back with me.”

There’s no fight in Alex, it’s the kind of exhaustion Maggie recognises from a day spent chasing dark thoughts in circles. 

“You know, it’s not about me. It’s about you.”

Alex’s eyes fly to hers in alarm, flabbergasted at hearing the turnabout of the cliche. She opens her mouth, but Maggie holds up a hand.

“Let me explain,” she breaks in, “Please.

She guides them up to scrape excess food into the bin and soak the dishes. The rush of the water in the sink buys her time to get her thoughts in order. 

“Listen, you’ve only just begun,” she explains. 

“Yeah, I know. I’m inexperienced,” Alex huffs, throwing the cutlery into the water.

“No, that’s not what I mean,” Maggie says, turning off the faucet and bringing them back to the quiet, “I mean that you’ve only just begun to realise your sexuality. What you like,  _ who _ you like. You’re only just realising all of those crushes, or those fantasies you pushed so far down inside yourself.”

As if reaching for a petrified animal, Maggie carefully curls her fingers around Alex's wrists.

“It’s time you stopped pushing,” Maggie says, “Explore the boundaries of your mind. Push yourself a little.”

Alex perks up, realising she had been heading down the wrong route. Energy bleeds in again. Suddenly very interested, she narrows her eyes, “What are you saying exactly?”

“I’m saying if you wanna do research…” She strokes her thumbs against the fleshy insides of Alex’s wrists, skimming the pulse. “I can suggest a few websites.” 

“Web-” Her wrists slip out of Maggie's grip, hands flattening in front of her as if she were pushing against a barrier. “You want me to watch porn?!”

Maggie can't help but chuckle as the scandalised tone. “If that’s something you find you like, yeah.”

Alex splutters, turning crimson. She plunges her hands into the water, scrubbing at their plates. Maggie grabs a tea towel, patiently waiting as Alex clears her throat. 

“I didn’t think that’s something you would share with someone.” She pauses, plates midair, before handing it over to Maggie to dry. 

Maggie doesn’t take up the discussion. Diligently, silently, she dries each fork, knife, glass and plate that Alex hands to her; dries them until they squeak. Then she stacks them back in their rightful places. She’s returning the cutlery to their drawer when Alex finally speaks.

“You don’t think it’s...weird that I’d be getting off to other women?”

Maggie turns suddenly, startling her. The drawer snaps shut behind her, and they’re toe to toe. “Have you ever gotten off thinking about other women?”

“I-well-I’ve uh…” Caged in her own personal space, Alex swallows. Maggie grins to show her she isn’t in trouble. “I’ve gotten off thinking about us.”

“While we’ve been together?”

“Yeah.” Alex licks her lips, flickers her gaze down and then up again. “And before.”

Maggie’s grin stretches across her cheeks, wide and cheeky. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Alex scoffs, and Maggie sees a youthfulness. Under the kitchen lights, she sees the freckles, sees the bashfulness, the lack of confidence. Alex has always been tripping around in circles, trying to find her rhythm. She can happily admit she has had her hand between Maggie’s thighs, and yet finds she can’t even admit it’s been between her own. 

Men can be possessive and jealous in relationships, she has been a cop long enough to know that. Truth be told, regardless of her past, she can be jealous too. But this is first and foremost about Alex’s sexuality and the need to explore who she is, what she wants. Maggie has been happy to lead most of the way, but she wants Alex to discover her own paths to take them down, too. 

“So you want me to do some homework, huh?” Alex asks. 

“Lots of it.” 

Peering coyly through her lashes, Alex hooks her fingers in the loops of Maggie’s jeans and tugs her close. “How will I be scored?”

“Your test will be a practical exam.”

She lets out a barely-restrained squeal as Alex lunges and lifts her by the back of her thighs.  

Mere days later, Alex sends an email titled  _ do not open at work.  _ It has links to Youtube videos; part of the Hysterical series. She isn’t familiar with it, but rapidly works out that it is a simple set up for each video: a woman sits with a vibrator between her legs, attempting to read as much of the literature in front of her as she can before her orgasm prevents her. 

As Alex tackles a late shift, Maggie watches a few clips and sees why Alex likes them. To see real female pleasure like that, almost on their own terms, is far less grotesque than the majority of mainstream pornography. 

Her pretty girl likes pretty girls, she muses. Alex notes her favourite video, a woman with breathy moans, brown eyes and long lashes. Maggie sits back in satisfaction, linking her hands behind her head and scheming. 

An opportunity arises with the strangest of timing; third time’s the charm is not a phrase she thought would have applied to a menstruation cycle. The third time she gets her period with Alex, she devises a plan, and orchestrates it in every step she leads Alex towards her bedroom.

The lamps are already dimmed to provide more of a glow than actual light, and the laptop is on the bed ready to go. She perches at the edge of her bed, and waves at Alex’s body.

“Take off your pants,” she says, “and your shirt.”

Alex blinks. “I thought you said you...uh.” She gestures vaguely in the direction of Maggie’s hips, and then notices the laptop. “Oh, Netflix?”

Maggie smirks and shakes her head, hair falling around her face. She shuffles up against the headboard, spreading her legs into a  _ V _ and patting the space between her knees. Alex unbuttons her blouse, and then shucks off her pants. She hovers by the bed as Maggie appraises her underwear choice, wringing her hands in the hem of her tank top. 

“Come on,” Maggie encourages.

Alex looks dubious, but obeys, sitting down.

“Wiggle the mouse.”

Leaning forward, Alex does just that, and then tenses as the screen brightens back up.

“Oh,” she manages.

“I watched a few of those videos you sent,” Maggie says, tracing Alex’s curved spine with a fingertip and enjoy the shiver that runs through her.

“What did you think?” Alex says, still staring at the screen.

“I can see why you liked her.” Maggie shifts her hips, getting comfortable against her own pang of cramps. “Press play.”

Alex finally twists to face her. “We’re gonna watch together?”

“Yeah,” Maggie says, leaning in until their noses almost brush. She lowers her voice, dripping with desire, just as she had practised in front of the mirror between brushing her hair and her teeth before Alex came over, “And I’m gonna touch you while we do.” 

As she hoped, Alex’s breathing hitches, her lips parting. In the background, the introduction to the video ends and the reading begins. 

“Sound okay?” she presses.

Alex nods, stealing a single chaste kiss. 

“Yeah.”

Maggie steals one back, making sure Alex can feel her smile before she leans back. “Turn around.”

With another nervous twitch, Alex shuffles around. Maggie tugs at the tank top, and she gets the message, shifting to rest back against Maggie’s body.

“There,” Maggie murmurs, nosing at Alex’s ear. 

The taller woman relaxes into her arms, as if sinking into a soapy, warm bath after a long day. Even with the pulse of arousal taking priority on her thoughts, she reveals in being that safe space for Alex.

The woman on screen begins to read from the novel, only the barest of tremble in her voice. She spins a tale of forest nymphs.

“Do you think she’s pretty?” Maggie prompts.

“Maggie,” Alex says, soft and embarrassed. 

She tips Alex’s chin around, making sure their eyes meet. “Alex, when have you ever been able to talk about this? About your attraction to women?” 

“Never. Before you, anyway,” Alex admits. 

“Exactly. Just because you’re out and you have a girlfriend, doesn’t mean you have to stop exploring yourself and your sexuality.” She trails her fingertips down Alex’s neck, her sternum, stomach, and then braces itself on her bare thigh. She enjoys the jump of the muscles. “I just so happen to be a lesbian, too. So if you wanna talk about pretty women, we can.” 

She strokes along Alex's cheekbone, seeing the darkening of her eyes as the woman gasps from the laptop.

“Besides,” she continues, “it’s me that you’re letting between those gorgeous legs at the end of the day.” 

Alex huffs, beaming, and then kisses her. Maggie hums, and then pulls back to nod at the screen.

“So,” she continues, “Do you think she’s pretty?”

“Yeah, she’s pretty.”

The woman on screen stutters, biting her lip in an attempt to ground herself. Maggie travels her hands up and down Alex's stomach, catching the hem on the next pass. She drifts up and around the curves of the cups of her bra.

“Why do you think she’s pretty?”

“She’s just…” Alex takes a moment to enjoy Maggie slipping a hand into her bra, a cheeky smile bursting over her face. “She’s got this look in her eyes, like she’s sweet and sexy at the same time.”

“She does.” In the lamplight, Maggie sees the goosebumps rise on Alex’s neck, feels her nipple stiffen against teasing fingers. “What else?”

“She’s got beautiful skin, and a beautiful mouth,” Alex sighs.

Maggie brushes her other hand around the waistband of Alex’s underwear. She is content to simply touch Alex and watch her reactions for a moment. She sees how Alex’s legs relax, opening further. How her breathing quickens at the sound of the woman’s moans. On screen, the woman is losing her battle against the sensation between her legs.

“You like the sounds she’s making?” Maggie asks.

“She sounds beautiful,” Alex answers, her voice a few tones raspier than before, “It’s like when you…” 

Alex’s statement falters as Maggie brushes down over the front of her underwear. The woman on screen stops reading, gasping out and arching forward as she comes. Maggie kisses lazily along Alex’s neck as the woman’s pleasure fills the air.

“When I what?” Maggie finally asks.

“When you start to breathe like that,” Alex groans, pushing her hips up as Maggie brushes her underwear again. “When I’m touching you.”

The video skips to another. This woman has hair down around her shoulders, her hands braced on the table beside her literature from the outset. She glances at the camera, unable to keep a smile off her face even as she tries to read.  

Maggie scrapes her teeth over Alex’s pulse point before growling, “Tell me about  _ her _ .”

“Her hands...they grip the table,” Alex says, the words stunted. 

“You think about her hands?”

“It makes me want…her fingers they just...make me want to...” Alex takes a deep, shuddering breath and licks her lips, craning her head back against Maggie’s shoulder. “...to ask you to fuck me.”

All Maggie’s thoughts silence at once, and for a moment, her mind consists of only Alex’s harsh breathing, the panting dictation of the woman on the laptop screen and a vicious throbbing between her own thighs.

Finally, her brain kicks in again, and she reacts. “You want me to fuck you?”

“Maggie,” Alex breaths, fisting the sheets on either side of Maggie’s hips, her full weight resting back now. “Please, please just touch me.”

Maggie doesn’t tease her anymore. She pushes her hand into Alex’s underwear and feels the wet heat of her, all from this game she had set. The woman is approaching her climax too as Alex's head lolls back and her hips push up into the circling, steady rhythm that is set. Maggie sees the white-knuckled grip the woman has on the table in the video, appreciates those long, spindly fingers, and then sinks two of her own inside her lover. 

Alex cries out, and it isn’t long at all before her mouth drops open, her hips rut upwards and her stomach clenches. She manages Maggie’s name, a hand flying to grip her wrist as Maggie fucks her through the waves of pleasure jerking through her. 

Eventually, Alex slumps back against her, chest heaving and eyes closed. Maggie carefully slides her fingers from Alex’s underwear and discreetly wipes them on her own thigh. Then, she just about manages to catch the spacebar with her toe, pausing the next video it had skipped onto.

She keeps her hand around Alex’s breast, enjoying the heart of her skin and measuring the gradual slowing of her heart rate. She waits for Alex's breathing to even out until she kisses over one flushed cheek and checks in.

“How you doing?” she murmurs, kissing the shell of Alex's ear.

“Dandy,” Alex drawls, linking her hands over her stomach.

After that, her attitude to sharing pornography with Maggie is altered forever.

~

It isn’t all bliss. The situation around Winn and Lyra proves that.

They go home together, of course, but something had dug in deep, settling under the atmosphere like a firecracker. Alex could hear it sparking and hissing all the way back to her apartment, but it doesn’t blow until they’re over the threshold.

As it happens, the something turns out to be the threatened  _ “You better have proof.”  _ It had rattled Maggie’s cage, and Alex curses herself for such an offhand comment. She didn’t want Maggie to think she didn’t value her, but it escalates into heavy accusations and bickering anyway. Eventually, it reaches the boiling point of an argument, but Maggie doesn’t run like Valentine’s. She stands her ground in Alex’s apartment, stepping closer, tempting. Suddenly, the firecracker that had fizzled and shot upwards now bursts against the sky, and then they are tearing each other’s clothes off and tumbling onto Alex’s bed.

Afterwards, Maggie’s bare chest still heaving and Alex’s sides marked in red claws, Maggie grins and tells her that she has just had her first fiery taste of how passionate anger can be.

Yet despite the occasion bump, Alex is in freefall.

Every day, she keeps falling into this relationship with Maggie, deeper and deeper. But she isn’t scared, because it’s more like a skydive. It’s exhilarating, breathtaking, heart-stopping.

Even as she sits on the edge of the bed in the medbay, Alex can feel the grip of Maggie’s hand, the wind whipping her face, the surge of hysterical laughter pressing at her gut-

“Agent Danvers, can you stop thinking about Detective Sawyer?” Hamilton, uninterested.

“What?” Alex sits upright, the wires attached to her swinging wildly. “How did you know-”

“Your heart started racing.”

The quickened beats of the monitor back up the statement, and Alex clears her throat as the pace calms.  

“Right,” she says.

“Your stress levels have improved in the last six months.” Hamilton takes a few readings from the advanced blood pressure gauge locked around Alex’s bicep. “I’m going to presume that’s the healthier sex life you’re enjoying.”

“Come on…” Alex scoffs, glancing at the entrance.

Hamilton fixes a stare on her from over her half-rimmed glasses. “You think I’m kidding?”

Alex knows she isn't. Hamilton has always had a sixth sense for all kinds of changes that could interfere with an agent physically or mentally. She is still the only one, bar J'onn, who could get her to crack when work was getting too much. With Kara or Maggie, she volunteers the information, but Hamilton could bleed the worries and anxieties out of her faster than any shrink.

And as for her conclusion, Alex couldn’t deny it. Being with Maggie had not only awakened her sex drive, but kickstarted it to function in ways she was still finding out about. She thought it had been virtually nonexistent, but was only dormant. She realised in the first few weeks of them sleeping together that she understood the romance novels. She understood the heat flushing into her stomach as she received an innuendo packed text. She understood kisses that could be described as electrifying. She understood how a single memory of Maggie's breathy sighs from a morning spent making love could wreck her concentration for hours.

If Hamilton thinks- or knows- that regular sex is keeping her stress levels low, there is no point in Alex denying it.

Hamilton flips the clipboard up and pries the probes off of Alex’s temples and chest. “Have you thought about asking her to bank some blood?”

Alex pulls her thermal shirt back over her hair, flicking her hair from her collar. “She isn’t an agent.”

“As if that’s stopped you breaking the protocol before,” Hamilton muses, lodging more information into her tablet as she pulls the blood pressure gauge from around Alex’s arm. “I was reviewing Bufusuk notes that smelt distinctly of the kind of coffee you only get in a precinct.”

Alex manages a wry smile. She had been running missions and sharing cases with Maggie since they began to trust each other. And as for protocol on the important things such as weapons access, it is all out of the window. She had once allowed Maggie into the shooting gallery under the guide of teaching her about “advanced safety around alien weaponry”, when really it was just to impress her.

(It had worked a charm, too, if the moans echoing from the otherwise empty DEO shower room was anything to go by).

She considers the suggestion as she hops off of the bed and leaves the bay. With her  check up signed off, she moves on to her next order of the day. She was informed this morning that she had to inspect a new vehicle that was designed and bought especially for the DEO when combating water-based aliens.

She encounters the chief mechanic, Agent Smith, in the DEO vehicle room, kicking at the tires of an SUV. Wordlessly, he hands her the paperwork on a clipboard, clearly having anticipated her visit.

“Why am I required to sign this?” she asks, frowning down at the words.

“We need it signed off today for a specialist mission tomorrow. But since Director Henshaw isn’t here today, you’re the one with authority.” He gives the tire another kick for good measure.

She makes a noise of interest, and then looks up around the garage. All makes and models of vehicles are in neat rows along her left, and to her right a number of armoured cars are being worked on by the team of mechanics.

“What is it, the new tech?”

Agent Smith grins, pushing up the rolled sleeves of his skirt a little higher. “A boat.”

“A… boat,” she says, “Literally, a boat. I thought it would have been a little more impressive.”

He shrugs, leading her towards an annex, weaving through the rows of jeeps. “We’re trying to expand our marina capabilities.”

“Oh, a special boat,” she marvels.

They shift through to the annex, where the boat sits on stints in the middle. It’s sleek, and well designed, a matte black colour. It may be technologically advanced, but to Alex it still looks like a fancy boat.  

Two agents are sitting to the side with thick rope tangled in their hands and around their feet, a laptop propped on some crates in front of them. Out of interest, Alex wanders over. On the screen is a burly sailor teaching his audience how to tie various types of navy knots.

“Is this a DEO approved instruction?” she jokes.

One of the agents cranes her neck around. “Can’t get a good look at the tech inside until you sign off on the pre-mission inspection, so I figured this was a fun time-filler.”

“Think it’ll help you tomorrow night?”

The other agent scowls at the rope in his grip. “Hell no, I’m not going. I get sea-sick.”

“Great to know our country’s bravest are out there protecting us,” Alex mutters.

She reads through the forms, signs each one, and then watches as they leap up and get to work. Then she takes their seat, picking up where they left off. Her curiosity gets the better of her as she knots and ties the rope into the complex patterns that the burly instructor is showing on the screen.

As per Maggie’s encouragement, she had searched, trawled through things that made her skin crawl in the worst way, and discovering things that made her pulse thump in the best.  She’d  seen some erotic things, women with bound wrists and hands, very BDSM leaning. She knows Maggie had ties and scarves, but did she have rope? Is that something either of them would be interested in?

Alex licks her lips, looking down at the finished product in her hand. It is thick, tight, and would hold against a lot of resistance.

Before her mind could drag her further down the rabbit hole, she feels the sudden onset of seizing cramps. As graciously as she can, she bids goodbye and goes to the bathroom. She slumps her shoulders when she sees the beginnings of blood.  

She had plans, but now watches them slip away. It is the first real night they’re going to get to spend together since the Emily situation. She knows that Maggie likes that bit of ballsy attitude each time she takes the initiative. Some lingerie, some kissing on her neck, and Maggie could be like warm dough in her hands. She doesn’t pretend she’s any different, but she likes being wanted, and knows Maggie likes that feeling too, so she had planned a night in honour of stitching them back together after Emily’s bombshell.  

She sighs, because she just can’t stand anything sexual on her period. She hates disappointing Maggie, but the stigma has been ingrained in her since she began being sexually active. Her girlfriend had encouraged her that orgasms helped with cramping, even through masturbation, but Alex couldn’t bring herself to do it. Maybe, she thinks, she could just make it about Maggie tonight, but she bats that away because she knows her girlfriend won’t let that stand.

In the lab, she brainstorms for a solution. Then it comes to her.

She had been cheeky, forking out for a nicer vibrator after they had begun fooling around with Maggie’s toys. She might not be comfortable with being touched when she’s menstruating, but Alex Danvers has her creative moments, and this is one of them.

She gets home an hour and a half before Maggie is due to come over. That gives her enough time to shower, put the new toy- still wrapped in its box- on the dining table, and then root through the bottom of her wardrobe for some of her old college notes. She had dumped most of it when she finished her degrees and joined the DEO full time, but there is a handful of reports that she kept because she was proud of the work she had accomplished and the marks she had received.

By the time the knock on her door comes, she is practically brimming with excitement.

“Hey babe,” Maggie greeted.

Alex barely breathes a  _ “Hey”  _ before her lips are on Maggie’s. With one hand she closes the door and the other she slides around Maggie’s waist and pulls their bodies closer, eliciting a noise indicating she's pleased. They pull back and Alex sees the delight in Maggie's darkening eyes.

“Wow, you wanna get right to it, huh?” Maggie says, reaching for the hem of Alex's shirt.

“Actually, no,” Alex says, catching her hands, “It's that time…”

Maggie’s shoulders slump, but there’s no malice in her voice as she says, “Oh.”

“But I uh…” Alex chews her lower lip, nervous excitement surging back. “I have an idea.”

“Oh,” Maggie repeats, an octave higher.

A few weeks before a middle school science fair, Alex had come up with the idea of doing something about fear and what causes it. Sticking her nose in a few books had told her that fear produced cortisol, a stress hormone. She grew eager to try and get her hands on cortisol, until she learned that the medical test required urinating into a jug for a week.

(She had won the top prize that year for something else that Jeremiah had helped her with, yet when she thought back on her she always remembered that childish revulsion at the test).

Still, Alex thinks about how a healthy dose of cortisol can bring dizzying relief and release. So she dives straight into her suggestion.

“How would you feel about being like one of those videos?” she says, trying not to jitter with the suggestion, “The ones where they read and they…”

She trails off, winding her wrist in the air in demonstration. Maggie’s mouth parts slightly before curling up into a devilish smile.

“You want me to read until I come?”

Alex’s throat constricts, but she nods through it.  

“I have a brand new toy.” She waves back to the box on the table. “If you want to do that?”

Outside of getting her dues when working big cases, Maggie doesn’t like much attention, and Alex knows that. She knows that sometimes, she finds it hard to be vulnerable. This act, with all of the humour stripped away, is incredibly vulnerable. She hopes she can convey just how much Maggie should trust her, but it is Maggie’s choice at the end of the day.

“Yeah,” Maggie finally says, still looking over in the direction of the wrapped box, “Yeah I wanna do that.” She meets Alex’s eye, swaying closer. “Got something in mind you want me to read?”

“Yeah, I’ve got something,” Alex answers, backing away and then going over to where the report sits on the table. “I’ve got it right here.”

She retrieves the 10 page report, feeling the weight of it in her grip. Even at that length, it is enough to tether her to the room despite the overtaking surrealism that Maggie is agreeing to her slightly off-kilter fantasy.

Maggie removes the toy from the box and inspects it as if it were a piece of evidence, running her fingertips along its functions and humming low in her throat.

“This must have cost you a pretty penny,” she says.

Alex approaches, report in hand. “I wanted it to be adaptable.”

Maggie looks up. “Adaptable?”

“You know, to your… preferences.”

“My preferences?”

Alex is fully aware that Maggie is playing with her, but nods, straight. “Yes.”

Maggie sniffs, lowering the vibrator and nodding at the papers. “So, what am I reading?”

Alex slides down the thick, blue-bound report from across the table. She carefully trains her gaze on Maggie’s face, seeing the surprise.  

“Lengthy…” Maggie notes, thumbing at the edges.

“I wanted to see how far through you got,” Alex says, “There’s no point if there’s no challenge.”

Maggie looks up, and that  _ challenge _ is silently met. She clicks her tongue on the roof of her mouth and flicks through the pages. “Wordy, too.”

“You can choose something else if you want.” Alex gestures at the bookshelf behind her, but it is simple theatrics. A dare put forward for Maggie to deviate from a plan already set.

“No this will be… interesting…” Maggie lets the pages flutter back so she can read the title in bold print on the first page. “Nanotechnology, huh?”

Alex backs away, taking her seat at the other side of the table. Maggie remains, and sits. They stare across the expanse of the table as if they were two opponents at a poker game. That is the atmosphere, the mood. The physical and mental distance stirs up electricity in the air. Maggie investigates the toy further, its sleek purple finish and gold trimmings. She finds the controls, easily clicking it on. Alex’s stomach clenches at that initial hum.

“Right between my legs?” Maggie purrs.

Alex chews the inside of her cheek and nods. Under the table and out of sight, her knee bounces in anticipation.  

Maggie turns the toy off and then unbuttons her jeans. She slides them off, neatly folding them and placing them on the chair to her right. Then, she clicks the toy back on, adjusting it between her legs and sitting back. Alex hears the rattle of it against her seat as Maggie catches her bottom lip between her teeth. She manages two seconds before she gasps out.

“Shit,” Maggie laughs, clenching her fists and taking a deep breath.

The tension broken, Alex lets out an excited puff of laughter. “Intense?”

Maggie nods, and then straightens up, flexing her hips just so. She closes her eyes, clears her throat. “Shall I go now?”

“When you’re ready.”

Maggie swallows, and then opens the report. Her mouth sets into a thin line as she concentrates on the first sentence. Even with all that they’ve done together and all of the things Alex has seen in her career, she knows that she is about to bear witness to something that will stay with her for a long time after this night is through.

“The use of nanotechnology in the field of medicine has been widely discussed,” Maggie starts, “However the use of alien nanotechnology is far less s-studied-”

The first stutter sends Alex’s heart thumping. Maggie twitches, but regains her concentration.

“-although it holds incredible promise. The Kavarian species have long utilized nanomaterials as drug delivery vehicles in battle. They are able to increase the Kavarian capacity for pain as well as increase muscle density.”

Maggie pauses, sucking in a breath through her teeth and tilting forward. She squirms in her chair, slipping her jacket off her arms and throwing it on top of her jeans. Alex splays low in her own chair, unselfconscious of her state. She tries to use it to relieve the sudden build up of arousal, considering she can’t do anything about it.

“Due to the fact Kavarian biology is relatively similar to that of humans, despite the extra limbs, it has been theorized that these n-an-” Maggie’s voice quivers, but she pushes on, her tone quietening. “Nanomaterials could be adapted for human medical use. We have shown that by interfacing these materials with human structures-”

Bit by bit, Maggie is losing her composure. Alex can see the thin sheen of sweat at her temples, the heat rushing to bloom in rosy patches on her cheeks. She reads on for a while, vocal chords becoming more and more taunt. Alex’s arousal hasn’t abated, only intensifying as she watches the toy taking Maggie’s will away by the word.

Maggie’s brow knits together as the first moan escapes, and Alex’s centre throbs for attention. She reaches her breaking point with the sound, biting her lip and throwing away her personal aversion completely. She slides her hand into her underwear, feeling the sticky heat of herself, but groaning at the relief her touch finally brings.

“...We have been able to teach them to recognize the human biological system as Kavar-” Maggie’s breath stunts as she settles into a rhythm with the toy. Her hands slowly pump in and out of fists as she clings to control.

“Initial studies have begun, using these n-nanoparticles in a s-shot that can be used to relieve pain and stimulate tissue recovery simultaneously in the field-”

She arches forward and moans slightly, breaking into a fit of giggles as she glances over at Alex. Even as she finds her own rhythm against her hand, Alex is enamored with the bashful reaction.

“Keep going,” she urges lowly, “Please, Maggie.”

She does, or she tries. Eventually biting the side of her fist, Maggie rolls her hips into the toy the furious buzz of it against the chair. She valiantly attempts to finish off the page.

“As a medical community we should seek to-”

Maggie cries out, gasping. She plants her hands on the table, curling around the edges until her knuckles whiten and her arms tremble. At the tossing back of her head, her face smoothing out in pleasure, Alex’s own pressure builds to an almost uncomfortable peak. Maggie gasps her name, careening back in the chair, her hips jerking forward against the toy, and that finishes Alex.

Maggie must manage to turn the toy off, and from the rumble of her throat, Alex must be moaning out as she comes. But as her head drops back and her hips twist up against her own fingertips, she’s engulfed in pleasure. It sings in her blood, heats up from her head to her toes, up her throat and down deep into her stomach with each tight contraction.

Blood still whooshing past her ears, Alex’s hips and head drop back down onto the chair. She tries to take a deep breath and feels each tingle of her nerves trying to calm from their high. Mustering the energy to raise her head, she gingerly pulls back her wrist to inspect the mess of her fingers inside of her shorts.

“Damn,” she mutters, making a face.

From the other end of the table, Maggie lets out a trill of giggles at the predicament, rough from her orgasm. Alex scowls, standing up and waddling her way to the bathroom, hand still resting in her underwear. She thoroughly cleans the blood from her fingers and changes her pad, making sure that her hands smell of the jasmine soap that Maggie bought her.

Maggie peers around the doorway, armed with the vibrator and wearing a pair of Alex’s briefs. She drops her own underwear into the hamper.

“You know when I’m at the next science division reinforcement session, and one of the nerds mentions the increased use of nanotechnology in domestic terrorism,” Maggie says, setting the toy down on the counter, “I’m gonna be like a Pavlovian dog.”

They share a laugh as Alex wrings her hands dry on a towel, and then hitches her hip against the sink. She reaches out, carefully brushing a strand of hair behind Maggie's ear.

“What was that report, anyway?” Maggie asks.

“A report from my early days at the DEO.”

“So you’re the author, huh?” Maggie grins. “That’s even better.”

Even with what they just did, Alex tips her chin down in embarrassment, murmuring, “Yeah, well.”

Maggie gently runs the back for two of her knuckles against Alex’s stomach, just below her navel. “How’s the cramps?”

“Better,” Alex admits, “You were right.”

“I always am.”

Alex rolls her eyes before cupping her cheeks and kissing the smirk from her lips. As affectionately as she can, she rubs her thumbs over Maggie’s cheeks and tries, with a single kiss, to convey what she can’t express with words. She doesn’t know how to say  _ I’ve never touched myself on my period, but tonight I couldn’t help it _ . She doesn’t know how to say  _ Thank you for being so open, for trusting me that way.  _ She doesn’t know how to say _ You looked gorgeous coming with my name on your lips and my words still fresh in your mind. _

So she pulls back, and rubs her thumbs over Maggie’s cheeks instead. They still blossom red with the aftermath of Maggie’s orgasm.

“Glad the cramps have eased,” Maggie says, breaking away to leave the bathroom, “Couch, chocolate Netflix?”

“Sounds amazing.”

She lingers in the bathroom, listening to the thrum of electricity in the bathroom lights. She fixes the fold of the towel over the rail, thinking about the punch she’d received as Emily told her that Maggie had cheated, and the satisfaction when the situation was resolved. If she is honest, the push for dinner had been an insecurity thing. She wanted to prove she was good enough for Maggie- a good enough lesbian- and it had felt like a test that backfired.

And maybe that is what tonight was about, too. Sure, Alex had shared her preference for the videos before Emily was in the picture, but not this fantasy, this scenario. She had sat back and watched her girlfriend display herself in such a vulnerable, unconventional way; so intimate from afar. Maybe, deep in her subconscious, this had been an attempt to prove that their trust is still intact, that their connection is unrifled by the appearance of such an important old flame-

“Babe?” Maggie yells, flopping onto the couch and fiddling with the remote, still only wearing Alex’s underwear and her shirt, “Did you watch an episode without me?!”

Alex blinks, dropped from her thoughts back into reality.

_ Shit _ .

**Author's Note:**

> All your thoughts are appreciated :)


End file.
